"What?"
Krista and I are sitting on my bed, drinking tea and staying up later than either one of us really needs to be up.
"This whole thing has made me so glad I never have to do my 20s over again."
"Really?" She's suspicious. "I've had a lot of fun."
"Really. They were great and crazy and fun, but I knew fuckall about anything. I had no idea what I wanted from jobs, relationships, apartment, cities. My sex life was grotesque." I repeat, louder, over her groan. "Was grotesque. I don't know if it'll be this way at the close of every decade, but I am so glad to be turning 30." I pause. "The Gospel According to Kelly."
"Thanks be to God."
***
"So basically everything is a whole lot of meaningless bullshit."
"You sound like we're back in college. But if you want to drink beer and sit up talking about the existence of God and the futility of our lives and sentient bags of carbon, we'll have to run to the liquor store."
My reaction when friends start existential crisis-ing around me is always one of three things. Best case scenario, I'll make them a cup of tea and listen. Second best case scenario, I'll say "Oh, honey" and give them a list of reputable therapists in the Twin Cities that I've compiled. Third scenario? I'll make fun of them.
That's what I do in this case. A friend of mine, normally the counterweight to my emotional excesses, has been reading a book of New Atheism. It's depressing him. I've spent the last few minutes listening to him talk about the meaninglessness of existence and how we're all wasting our lives eating, fucking, and shitting (three activities I know he enjoys thoroughly while in a better mood).
"C'mon," I say, tying my shoe laces
"What?"
"Put on your shoes. I'm taking you for a run."
"What's the point?"
"At the moment? Spiking your dopamine levels so you enjoy eating, fucking, and shitting again. It's either this or we're going to have sex. Your pick."
He puts on his shoes.
"For what it's worth, 18 year old Kelly would probably stage a hunger strike over the life I'm living now." I wait for a moment. "God, she was such a cunt. But. Either way, maybe neither of us is getting it exactly right."
"What the fuck?"
"You sound like we're back in college. But if you want to drink beer and sit up talking about the existence of God and the futility of our lives and sentient bags of carbon, we'll have to run to the liquor store."
My reaction when friends start existential crisis-ing around me is always one of three things. Best case scenario, I'll make them a cup of tea and listen. Second best case scenario, I'll say "Oh, honey" and give them a list of reputable therapists in the Twin Cities that I've compiled. Third scenario? I'll make fun of them.
That's what I do in this case. A friend of mine, normally the counterweight to my emotional excesses, has been reading a book of New Atheism. It's depressing him. I've spent the last few minutes listening to him talk about the meaninglessness of existence and how we're all wasting our lives eating, fucking, and shitting (three activities I know he enjoys thoroughly while in a better mood).
"C'mon," I say, tying my shoe laces
"What?"
"Put on your shoes. I'm taking you for a run."
"What's the point?"
"At the moment? Spiking your dopamine levels so you enjoy eating, fucking, and shitting again. It's either this or we're going to have sex. Your pick."
He puts on his shoes.
***
"I've been asking myself the same question a lot of people as around our age."
"What's that?"
"What would 18 year old me think if he could see me as I am now?"
"Well?"
"I think he'd be pretty zazzed."
Pause.
"The problem is that my reaction to that kid would probably be to yell 'You know nothing!' and punch him in the face."
"For what it's worth, 18 year old Kelly would probably stage a hunger strike over the life I'm living now." I wait for a moment. "God, she was such a cunt. But. Either way, maybe neither of us is getting it exactly right."
***
"Adulthood is a weird thing."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah." We're in the car with the windows down, covered in a fleece blanket because it's cold, but we like the feeling of the wind washing through the car. "I have this job that I love and that I'm actually kinda good at. I pay my bills on time, take grown-up vacations, juggle social obligations and personal needs. I had a whole fucking therapy session where I complained about all of the things my parents did wrong, cried, and then stopped blaming them."
"Those do sound like things you do as an adult." I can hear the slight, sassy edge in her voice.
"Phhhhhhhbt. But here's the thing. For years, that whole time I was in graduate school, and again while I was living Duluth, I was miserable."
"You were depressed."
"Yes, and I know there are a bunch of chemical reasons why that was happening. I get the brain chemistry, or at least as much as I'm ever going to, but I was heaping extra shit on top of an already enormous shit sandwich." I shiver and pull the covers up higher. "Since I was a teenager, I had this idea of what adulthood was like. It meant that you had to give up all the stuff you loved."
"Kels, I love you, but you are a complete fucking idiot sometimes."
"I know. So now. It's funny. I have ice cream for dinner sometimes. I read comic books on a regular basis, listen to a podcast about video games. I spent an entire hour and a half yesterday looking for a cosplay wig. And do you have any idea how many hours, hours I sit cross-legged on my livingbedroom floor in my underwear and a tank top blogging about comic books and video games and feelings. This is adulthood?"
"This is adulthood, honey. Welcome to it."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah." We're in the car with the windows down, covered in a fleece blanket because it's cold, but we like the feeling of the wind washing through the car. "I have this job that I love and that I'm actually kinda good at. I pay my bills on time, take grown-up vacations, juggle social obligations and personal needs. I had a whole fucking therapy session where I complained about all of the things my parents did wrong, cried, and then stopped blaming them."
"Those do sound like things you do as an adult." I can hear the slight, sassy edge in her voice.
"Phhhhhhhbt. But here's the thing. For years, that whole time I was in graduate school, and again while I was living Duluth, I was miserable."
"You were depressed."
"Yes, and I know there are a bunch of chemical reasons why that was happening. I get the brain chemistry, or at least as much as I'm ever going to, but I was heaping extra shit on top of an already enormous shit sandwich." I shiver and pull the covers up higher. "Since I was a teenager, I had this idea of what adulthood was like. It meant that you had to give up all the stuff you loved."
"Kels, I love you, but you are a complete fucking idiot sometimes."
"I know. So now. It's funny. I have ice cream for dinner sometimes. I read comic books on a regular basis, listen to a podcast about video games. I spent an entire hour and a half yesterday looking for a cosplay wig. And do you have any idea how many hours, hours I sit cross-legged on my livingbedroom floor in my underwear and a tank top blogging about comic books and video games and feelings. This is adulthood?"
"This is adulthood, honey. Welcome to it."
"What the fuck?"
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